Barsati chappal

In a post-Independence India, Delhi's barsatis evolved as a charming example of Indian jugaad where residents turned the small rooftop space on the city's low rise buildings into a full-fledged dwelling. Open to the elements, these homes—essentially small apartments with large terraces—once offered affordable housing in the middle of the city. But with the gentrification of small neighbourhoods and increased construction of high-rises, the much romanticized Delhi barsati is rapidly disappearing. So, when an expat friend decided to make one his home, interior designer Shivani Dogra took it as an opportunity to revive its “distinctive laid-back charm and natural style”. Warli paintings, sourced during the client's travels, frame the dining area The challenge here was to open up the 1,000-square-foot space and create a modern dwelling that paid homage to its heritage. “This barsati, a remnant of an older, slower Delhi, stimulated the imagination and it was a joy to work with the history, natural light and charm of the existing space. I sought to amplify the good that it contained and tinker minimally with the existing structure and style,” Dogra explains. Delhi Barsati: Maximising Space Vestiges of the original structure remain in the form of the wall lights, ceiling and Kota stone flooring. The rest of the home was opened up with prudent design interventions. The wrought iron grills that shielded the large windows in the living room were removed to allow for an unobstructed ...

Stealing its name from the Urdu for rain, barsati was a tiny room with a large terrace that went on to spawn a bohemian Delhi civilisation. Holed up high in these airy bubbles, eclectic migrants from small towns came of age in style and sensibility. Many barsatiwallas became famous. MF Husain had a barsati in Jangpura. William Dalrymple, who lives in a farmhouse, spent the early 1990s in Delhi in a Golf Links barsati. Pankaj Mishra, who cohabits with the literary jet-set in London, was cooped up in a Defence Colony barsati. Anita Desai made barsati the setting of her short story The Rooftop Dwellers. A freak of chance, barsati was borne out of Delhi’s real estate regulations. Residences in many neighbourhoods were permitted to have nothing taller than a small room at best on the second floor. This spare room in the house evolved into barsati, the rain shelter. From the 1970s onwards, house owners started to rent out these to students and young artists/professionals who were unencumbered by family or furniture. Later on, the relaxation of rules enabled the construction of higher floors, turning bungalows into multi-stories. Barsati became less common, and hairstylist Sylvie left her Green Park barsati for Gurugram. The decline is neatly traced in the life of author and curator D Bhattacharjya Tato, who used to live in a BK Dutt Colony barsati. “There was this huge terrace that separated my room from the staircase… on a rainy day when I would be coming back to my pad, I woul...

The Barsati, a small rooftop abode, is a characteristic feature of residential architecture in Delhi from an older period. The word Barsati comes from the Hindi word Barsat, meaning rain & refers to a room built on the roof of a house that covers approximately a third of the total floor area. Typically used as a store room or as living quarters for domestic help, the Barsati is from a period when the Delhi skyline was low lying and open spaces aplenty. Back then it was also an affordable rental housing option for young professionals, artists and intellectuals. The past decade however, has brought a change in planning laws resulting in older houses giving way to apartments and taking with them the Barsati. On my first job in Delhi, whilst searching for a house to rent, I remember seeing several Barsatis, each one more unique than the other, every one of them offering innumerable design possibilities. Many of the Barsatis I was shown, touched the tops of Gulmohar, Mango, Jamun or Neem trees, were filled with plants and had the odd charpoy, swing or mooda placed to soak in the winter sun. They took one back to a time when it was common to live a more natural lifestyle and also safe to sleep on the terrace in the summer. Recently on a studio hunt, I found to my dismay that many of the characterful older houses I’d once seen had been converted into repetitive apartment blocks built wall to wall. Of the older houses that still had Barsatis, many were converted into trendy design...